The daily newspaper reports this week that a team of agents withthe US Transportation Security Administration’s special operationsgroup entered Newark Airport on February 25 and attempted to boarda plane with fake bombs. One of the secret agents, claims the Post,successfully passed two separate security screenings whilecontaining an improvised explosive device-like contraption in hispants.
“He did have a simulated IED in his pants,” the sourcetells the paper. “They did not find it.”
According to the person familiar with the incident, the “bomber”made it to his gate in Newark’s Terminal B, where aircraftbelonging to American Airlines, JetBlue and Delta all regularlydock.
With 33,869,307 passengers going in and out of Newark in 2011,it is one of the busiest transportation hubs in the world. But isit the safest?
The latest report mishap is only the most recent in a laundry listof incidents in recent months that have raised serious concernsabout security breaches at Newark. Eleven years ago, agents ofal-Qaeda boarded a United Airlines flight departing Newark andhijacked it in the air, reportedly hoping to crash the aircraft inthe US Capitol Building. The attempt was foiled and the planecrashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, killing all onboard. A decadeafter that tragedy, though, incidents continue to occur atNewark.
Last year, 52 screeners at Newark were fired for major securitylapses. In 2010, one passenger was caught walking into a securearea within the airport without presenting a ticket, arequirement.
Speaking of the latest incident, the Post’s source says,“This episode once again demonstrates how Newark Airport is theGround Zero of TSA failures.”
In October, New Jersey’s Star-Ledger newspaper reported that aleaked copy of an official TSA evaluation of Newark Airportdocumented a history of dastardly behavior. According to thatreport, TSA agents at Newark perform their job duties correctlyjust a fraction of the time, executing standard pat-downs properlyonly in 16.7 percent of cases and taking appropriate action withprohibited items passing through check-points in around one-quarterof the instances that they were evaluated on.
"There’s that often-repeated phrase, ‘We’ve got to get itright all the time,’” law professor Thomas McDonnell told thepaper for their report. "When it’s under 50 percent, under 20percent, that to me is very shocking."
The Post adds in this week’s report that of the four agents onTSA’s “Red Team,” one member was stopped at a security checkpoint.According to the source, the officer was a female agent“carrying a simulated IED inside her carry-on that was inside achild’s doll.”
It had “wires sticking out,” the source said, and wasobviously suspicious.
The TSA has responded to the report by declining to disclose anyofficial details.
“Due to the security-sensitive nature of the tests, TSA doesnot publicly share details about how they are conducted, whatspecifically is tested or the outcomes,” the agency tells ThePost.
